Chapter Two
Initiating a Software Project
By
Askale T.
05/08/2024 1
Chapter objectives
• After completion of this chapter, you have to
be able to:-
– Determine what the project’s purpose is
– Handle the various organizational entities
– Understand the project’s feasibility
– Know what mean project initiation?
– Recognize the concept of project charter
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Identifying the Project Purpose
• To be a successful project manager, you have to start
by ironing out a few details mainly make sure these
questions are asked and successfully answered:
– Why is the project being initiated? -Project purpose.
– Does everyone agree on this purpose and goals?-
Consensus
• The project purpose is just a fancy way of
understanding the background of why the project is
being initiated.
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…contd’
• If you don’t have enough background
information, you won’t be able to ask the right
questions to create a solution that solves the
problem, grabs the opportunity, or improves
the organization.
• The goal of this point is to understand why the
project is being initiated.
• To be in tune with the structure of your
organization.
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Talking to the stakeholders
• When a project is being initiated, capture information
as much as possible about the project goals.
• Without a clear picture of what the project is to
capture, it’s going to be challenging to plan and
prepare for your software project.
• Stakeholders, will have different concepts about what
signifies that a project is complete.
• You need to know what their expectations are so you
can reach the project completion with few surprises
(or headaches).
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…contd’
• Here are five questions every project manager should
ask stakeholders:
– What are the factors for completion?
– What is the goal of this project?
– What are the areas of the organization that this project will affect?
– What is the project priority?
– What is the accepted range of variance?
• Each level of your organization has different needs,
different concerns, and different goals for your project. You
need to address each level of your organization to get the
project moving to completion.
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Reaching project consensus
• During the initiation processes, your goal is to get the
majority of the stakeholders on the same page.
• To reach project consensus, your goal is to find common
ground, and then to address ancillary(additional) requests
that don’t infringe, change, or drive out the original
project purpose.
• There are several approaches to accomplishing this goal:
– Conduct interviews
– Do root cause analysis
– Do business analysis
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Initiating the project
• Initiation is the time to build a firm foundation for your
project.
• Purpose: to formally launch and authorize a new project
or to authorize an existing project to continue into its
next phase.
• Projects get initiated to fulfill many different needs like
– A problem needs to be solved.
– An opportunity needs to be captured.
– A profit needs to be made.
– An existing environment needs to be improved.
– A process needs to be speeded up and/or made more efficient.
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Select a Project
• Matching the project to the goals and capabilities of the
organization is critical to the success of the project.
Guidelines
• Determine the business need, opportunity, or threat the
project is intended to address.
• Inputs to be analyzed include:
– Description of the product or service of the project.
– Organization's strategic plan.
– Any relevant historical information
– Organization's project selection criteria.
– Conduct a feasibility analysis
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…contd’
Feasibility Analysis
• Feasibility analysis is an analysis and evaluation of
proposed project to determine technical, operational and
economic feasibility.
A. Technical feasibility: consider the technical feasibility of the
proposed project.
Important questions
Is the project feasible within limits of current technology?
Software and hardware?
Can it be upgraded to new system?
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…contd’
B. Operational feasibility
• Is dependent on human resource available for the
project and involves projection whether the system
will be used if it is developed and implemented.
Important questions
Is the system developed, will it be used?
Are the services flexible and expandable?
Will the end users and or management adopt to the
change?
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…contd’
C. Economic feasibility
Is referred to as cost/benefit analysis
Important questions
Is the system cost effective?
The cost of doing full system study.
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…contd’
• Reading Assignment
– Discuss on the other types of feasibility studies?
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Project Stakeholders Selection
• A stakeholder is a person who has a business interest
in the outcome of a project, or who is actively
involved on a project.
• Stakeholders take on various roles and
responsibilities on projects.
• Sponsor
– Signs and publishes the Project Charter.
– Has ultimate responsibility for project success.
– Signs off on all planning documents and change requests.
– Authorizes team to use resources.
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…contd’
– Champions and mentors the project manager and team.
– Reviews progress and quality.
– Cuts through red tape and expedites activities.
• Customer
– Takes delivery of the project output.
– Pays for the project output
– Defines needs for the project output.
• Functional Managers
– Contribute and control functional resources to project
(people, equipment, and so on).
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…contd’
• Project Manager
– Works with stakeholders to define the project.
– Plans, schedules, and budgets project activities with team input.
– Works with the team to carry out project plans.
– Monitors performance and takes corrective action.
– Keeps the sponsor and the stakeholders informed.
– Requests and documents scope changes.
– Acts as a liaison between the project team and other stakeholders.
• Project Team Members
– Work with the project manager to carry out plans.
– Interface with sponsor and other stakeholders through the project
manager.
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…contd’
Project Manager Selection Criteria
• Project manager selection criteria are the standards and
measurements used to identify the candidate with the right
mix of skills, knowledge, attitudes, and experience to fit a
particular project.
• Common categories for project manager selection include:
– Skills and knowledge.
– Project management experience.
– Organizational experience.
– Personal leadership style.
– Problem solving skills.
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Create a Project Charter
• A project charter is a document written by the person
who has the authority within an organization to authorize
the project to move forward.
• This individual has the positional power to authorize resources
and funds.
• The project charter may be written by the project manager, but is
signed by someone with more power in the organization than
you.
• This person typically becomes the project sponsor.
• The charter should be signed by a person whose role in the
organization is higher than all managers that may have employees
on your project team.
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…contd’
• After the charter is signed by your project sponsor,
Either way, all key stakeholders should receive the
charter so they’re aware of the official project launch,
your authority as the project manager, and who’s the
sponsor of the project.
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…contd’
• A project charter accomplishes the following:
– It identifies the project manager in writing.
– It identifies the project sponsor in writing.
– It authorizes the project manager to spend organizational
resources on the project.
– It describes the product. That’s right; the description you
worked so hard to create goes in the project charter.
– It specifically identifies the business need that the project was
undertaken to address. If you have a business case, you can pull
information
from there.
• A project charter authorize the project.
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Sample project charter
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…contd’
• After project initiation other series project process
will continue which covers:-
– Planning the project
– Executing the project
– Controlling the project
– Closing the project
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The End!
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